I guess I was accidentally lucky that I just happened to be one of the last generations of people that grew up in society when there was no social media. We barely had the internet when I was graduating high school. It was so poor to the point that there wasn't really much reason to use it.
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The notion that just 10-15 years later that everything that we ever did would become part of the public record and that we would elect to do it was something that we probably wouldn't be capable of fathoming back in those times. Hell, I remember when you would get booted off the internet when someone would call your house and yes, we called people's houses because almost nobody had mobile / cell phones.
I think that things were better then as far as mental health was concerned. If someone had something embarrassing happen to them you might end up hearing about it, but it wouldn't all of a sudden become something that everyone knew about immediately and there was almost zero chance of it ending up on video. These days, I feel like kids intentionally video things and even set up other people in embarrassing situations purely for the sake of being able to record it and put it online at the other person's expense. Why someone would be so cruel and do this to another person is a level of cruelty that is difficult for me to understand.
A really good friend of mine had his child commit suicide a few years back and obviously, this has been extremely hard on his family. The reason why his boy killed himself was because of bullying related to social media and the pressures that exist for teens as far as popularity and bullying are concerned. This is something that they have to deal with every day for the rest of their lives and I can't even imagine how terrible it must be.
I am a big believer that social media, especially the likes of FB and Instagram are very detrimental to people's lives and mental health and this is especially true for teens who feel the need to be as "famous" as they possibly can be.
This was true when I was in high school as well but my ability to be popular was largely based on how nice I was to people or how many things we had in common, it had nothing to do with who had the best technology or apps on our phones.
While these are still very low numbers thankfully, the fact that the rate doubles in the United States right around the time that social media started to be all encompassing for people and especially young people, isn't a coincidence. The pressure that people feel to live up to impossible standards, probably most prominently in girls, must be excruciating.
The pressure existed when I was in high school as well. The skinny girls got a lot more attention and were sometimes almost by default the more popular ones and to a lessor degree this was a standard for the boys as well. I was reasonably popular but it wasn't really something that I aspired to rank up in. We didn't have a digital group where we were able to track another person constantly. You would see your friends at parties and how you behaved there likely determined whether or not your social status went up or down.
The likelihood of you being intentionally put in place to be the victim of a prank was very low and even if it did happen it was likely in good spirits whereas some of the stuff I see teens doing to one another these days is downright cruel... sometimes to the point of being criminal.
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I would imagine that this data is cherry-picked to make the situation seem as dire as possible but the fact remains that there is a definite correlation between the rise of social media and teen suicide rate and the self-harm could be attempted suicide or cries for help of sorts.
I don't know what the solution is here. I did see that I think it was DeSantis that was proposing that people not be allowed to have social media accounts until they are 18 or something like that but well, good luck with that buddy. That isn't going to work and I think even he knows that.
Social media has lead to the decline of the moral fabric of society in many ways and I am happy that I am not part of it and even happier than I am not a teenager during these times. Being a teenager was awkward enough without having every thing that you do potentially ending up on YouTube or TikTok.
If you are a parent, what do you do about this sort of thing?
Social media is full on and this is not normal. Not only within our lives but highlighting problems around the world which we would never even know about so this is 24 hour stress highlighting shite every where and there is no hiding from it. A parent should just be supportive of their kids and also make sure they are not caught up on their phones and have a break from social media.
I heard something on a podcast the other day that while our social media in the west focuses on impossible beauty standards, stupid shit like bullying strangers in public, and "alternative lifestyles" being the norm that China's social media is almost exclusively science, art, education, and lifestyle stuff that is quite wholesome.... oh and they cut it all off for everyone at 10pm.
I'm not saying that I want to live in an authoritarian society, but parents just stopped being parents at some point in the past 20 years. had social media existed when I was a kid my parents would have censored the hell out if it and while I didn't like the restrictions that were placed on me as a kid, I am now quite appreciative of all the restrictions that my parents had on my life when I was a child. It helped me to grow into a much better adult.
Yeehaw! Ride on, partner! Stay true to your roots and keep that cowboy spirit alive. Don't let the digital tumbleweeds knock you off your horse. Focus on ropin' in the good times and don't let the cyberbullying varmints break your spirit. It's a wild frontier out there, but you've got the grit to weather the storm. Stand tall like a cowboy at sundown and keep on ridin' with the wind at your back.
hahaha. I love your responses!
Gather 'round the fire, dear friend. Your words bring warmth to the camp and light to our souls. Happy storytelling!
I wonder how much of this is the correlation/causation fallacy with social media as a handy scapegoat, and how much is truly negative effects. We're also dealing with splintering families, kids medicated out the wazoo for ADHD and more, and schools treating kids more and more like failed experiments if they don't fit the mold assigned to them by the state. Churches have broadly failed to be sanctuaries, too. And let's not ignore how the past 4 years of COVID policies have absolutely destroyed so many people psychologically.
That said, social media IS a cesspool, and parents should be cautious about both how they share their kids on their own accounts and how they introduce their kids to social media. I think old-school forums and modern blogging sites (coughHIVEcough) are far healthier than the algorithm-fueled behemoths like Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and the rest.
Just banning social media doesn't build relationships and healthy support networks for kids. We need community, and social media has always been (and will always be) a counterfeit for that.
There is always a threat of something being a coincidence rather than directly related I suppose but you make some really good points above. It isn't JUST social media but social media has lead to the world becoming more of a mean place than it was before. Kind of like Mike Tyson said about how social media convincing people they can say anything and not get punched in the face for it. That's not a correct quote and he may have not even said it, but I would imagine that you have heard it before.